Appeal against persecutors: Jehovah judges His people

Psalm 7 appeals to Jehovah, on the ground of the righteous and
more than righteous dealing of the godly with their enemies, that
Jehovah may arise and awake to the judgment He has commanded, and
that thus, by the deliverance of the remnant by judgment, the
congregation of the various nations of the earth would compass Him
about. He would then judge the peoples, thus distinctly bringing
out the future judgment. Another point is brought out here. The
Lord judges the righteous man. If a man turn not, but go on in his
wickedness, His wrath will follow him.

The two principles connecting Christ on earth with the remnant

In all this we have the Spirit of Christ as it associates itself
with the Jewish remnant, and in certain respects Christ Himself
called to mind; that is, as passing through the circumstances
which enabled Him to enter into theirs with truth (for we have
seen that the effect on His soul personally was never what it is
in the remnant). It is not His history, but His sympathy with
them. There are two principles which connect Christ on earth and
the remnant in the latter days: He takes them in grace into His
place as on earth,* and He enters into theirs. As to the nature
and principles of their life, the righteous have the sentiments of
the Spirit of Christ as it would work in their state. Their
appeals are the expression of this. And God allows their claims
(though they have not clear intelligence respecting this),
furnishing in the Psalms expressions to them. It is a need and a
desire too which the life that is in them legitimates to His heart
who can take account of the ground Christ has laid for blessing,
which makes Him righteous in forbearance, though the
righteousness, as to the Jews, be not yet manifested. Their
knowledge of what Jehovah is as respects integrity and oppression
what He has ever been makes them look for a deliverance which
seems impossible.**

{*See Matthew 17: 24-27, already when here below. This may seem
in a measure anticipation: still, He revealed the Father's name to
them.}

{**Leviticus 9: 22-24 strikingly shows this. The acceptance of
the sacrifice by God was not manifested till Moses and Aaron had
come out after going in (v. 24) Christ as priest and king. Then
the people worship, but Aaron blessed from the offering before. We
know by the Holy Ghost come out that the offering has been
accepted, while the priest is yet within the veil. And hence the
full value of divine righteousness.}

The expectation of faith

There is another expression to note here "how long?" It
expresses the expectation of faith. God cannot reject His people
for ever: how long will He deal with them as if He did, and take
no notice of oppression? Hence in one place He says, There is none
that knoweth how long. As a whole, then, these psalms are a
general exhibition of the state of the remnant of the Jews before
God in the latter day, and the principles on which their souls
stand as godly not as yet the strong outpouring of their feelings
under the trial of circumstances. Is Christ then absent from them
all? Surely not, or the Psalms were not here. Christ entered in
sympathy into their condition, forms the faith of their hearts in
it by His Spirit, is thus fully found in their low estate in the
best way. His own personal feelings when on earth they do not
express,* though He has learnt by His own sorrows in like
circumstances blessed truth! to have a word in season for him
that is weary.

{*I do not mean by this that none of the psalms
do. We know this is not so, as Psalm 22 notably shows; nor that no
sentence is found in psalms which are not wholly of Him which does
express feelings He had. I have referred to several in the course
of these notes and stated the principle of their application
already; but I here speak of the psalms I am treating of (Psalms
3-7).}